Bush pledges to Support Saudi Nuclear Power Program: Good Idea # 1,614,368

[BFFs: President Bush and Saudi King Abdullah]

(Democracy Now) — “You know, I’d like to know the insane asylum in which this policy was concocted. The idea of giving enriched uranium to the Saudis while threatening war with the Iranians for enriching uranium is astonishing. The idea that the Saudis are going to somehow lower the price of oil on the basis of possibly getting nuclear reactors in the future is just almost staggering to think about. It’s something, I guess, we’ve come to expect with the Bush administration…

We have to remember that when the Shah was in power in Iran so many years ago, he was in the process of buying thirty-six reactors, and had those reactors been completed before he fell to the Ayatollah, Iran would now have thirty-six reactors. So what the Bush administration is telling us is that this current Saudi government is always going to be in power and it’s perfectly fine for them to have nuclear reactors. We know that India and Pakistan built—both built nuclear weapons from their commercial atomic power programs, as perhaps did South Africa. And it’s just almost staggering to think about this prospect…” Click for full article

Comment: There was hardly a brouhaha over this story in mainstream media outlets, but it’s serious business. I don’t think even Bush opponents fully grasp the insanity of this administration. Harvey Wassermen, a Member of the anti-nuclear movement, hits all the important points in the above interview. Already 13 Middle East countries have expressed their interest in atomic energy programs, spurred in large part by their worries over Iran’s nuclear program, but also by long term energy fears and and Western governments’ reckless ambition to supply the nuclear technology to anyone interested. No matter that it’s the most volatile region in the world, or that’s its governments come and go, sometimes being replaced by highly unfavorable ones as seems to be the trend. Foresight: not a specialty of our foreign policy makers. The 21st century is going to be a juicy one.